


Venom

by shit-escalates (Schm0use)



Series: Assemble [3]
Category: Red Rising Trilogy - Pierce Brown
Genre: Avengers AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-05
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-13 01:08:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4501974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schm0use/pseuds/shit-escalates
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"With great power, comes great..." </p><p>An origin story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Venom

When Sevro was six years old, his father was killed in the line of duty.

He remembers walking home from school with his mother that day. He remembers she made him a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and while he was still eating, there came a knock on the door. He remembers the two men in full uniform who spoke quietly to his mother. He remembers the way her legs gave out from under her, as she crumpled, sobbing, to the ground.

He remembers all this, but he does not remember it ever sinking in, the realization that his dad was never coming home again. He isn't sure when he came to terms with it.

Perhaps he never did.

***

Ten years later, he finds himself out back behind the high school, by the lunch tables. There's blood in his mouth. He spits it out.

“Well, anytime you pissheads are ready to give up, just let me know.” He says.

The group of kids surrounding him laugh darkly, all together, but he ignores them. He's looking straight at their leader, a long-legged and beautiful girl who sits on one of the lunch tables like it's a throne.

Normally, just having Antonia look their way would make any boy in the school stand up a little bit straighter, but not in Sevro's case. No, he and Antonia have never quite seen eye to eye (and not just because she's a head taller than him).  

A burly boy goes to grab him, but Sevro rolls and springs at him. They go down in a heap and Sevro is swinging, swinging, some blows landing and some not.

He feels hands seize him, drag him off, someone punches him in the mouth and Sevro makes sure to bare his teeth. Maybe not the best idea. He thinks he feels one come loose. But whoever hit him hisses in pain as they split their knuckles. There is more blood on his tongue.

Someone yells, “STOP!”

And Sevro's heart sinks, because he knows exactly who that is.

“Let him go,” Quinn says. She's got something behind her back, hiding it.

Sevro tries to look about as nonchalant as he can. “Hey, Quinn,” He says, hoping he sounds cool, with maybe an air of devil-may-care about him. After all, what roguish charmer doesn't occasionally find themselves being beat up on the regular after class lets out, right?

Right.

“It's all good, Quinn, I got it handled...”

She basically ignores him, which is doing wonders for his self-esteem. Far from leaving him to get punched in peace, she reveals what she was hiding: a baseball and wooden bat. The group stares at her. So does Sevro.

She points the bat at the group. “Oy, are you deaf? I said, _let him go_.”

The bullies do not, on the whole, look very afraid. Sevro knows this is their mistake.

“Right then.” Quinn says. She lobs the baseball in the air. And then drives a home run directly into the face of the big kid restraining Sevro.

He goes down in a spray of blood, rolling on the ground. Quinn puts the bat on her shoulder and looks at Antonia, eyebrow raised.

Antonia rises from her perch, tossing her hair over her shoulder. She glides past her clique without a word to any of them, stopping by Quinn.

“You should sit with us at lunch.” Antonia says.

Quinn tilts her head. “I already have someone to sit with at lunch.”

Antonia looks at Sevro, face bloodied and bruised, then back to Quinn. “Your loss.”

She turns and walks away. Her friends follow, supporting their incapacitated member between them. Quinn watches them round a corner, then turns back to Sevro.

“'I'm staying late after school,' you said,” Quinn calls, as Sevro picks himself off the floor, scrubbing at his face with his sleeve. “'Head home without me.'”

“It was the truth.” Sevro points out.

“Yeah, it sure was.”

“What are you still doing here, Quinn?” Sevro asks. He hopes he doesn't sound annoyed—he's not. He just wishes she hadn't seen him getting his face smashed in.

“I wanted to see if you wanted to go to the science fair at the university.” She says.

Sevro squints at her. “You knew they were gonna try and beat me up, didn't you?”

“Yeah.” Quinn nods. “That as well. So, wanna go see some science, tough guy?”

Sevro sighs. “Sure. Why not.”

***

The fair is bustling by the time they get there. The exhibits are pretty cool, for the most part, Sevro thinks. He wanders up and down the rows, trailing behind Quinn, who is all about this stuff. Brave, beautiful, and the smartest person he knows, that's his best friend.

He will never be in her league. He's so out of her league he might as well be Captain Nemo.

He watches Quinn talk to a group about their hydroponics project for awhile, his attention wandering... before it's caught again by something a little more interesting than soil-less plant growing. There's a table off to the corner without many people near it, and it's got some sort of cage on it. He scoots closer to get a better look.

There's a mopey looking kid standing behind the desk who doesn't look much older than Sevro himself—though he's got to be at least a freshman in college to have entered the fair.

“What's in the cage?” Sevro asks, peering inside the glass.

“It's a _terrarium_. Dude, what happened to your face?” The college kid says. His name tag reads: Cyther. Sevro gives Cyther a deadpan stare.

“What's in the _terrarium_?” He asks slowly.

“Glad you asked.” Cyther says. He taps the side of the glass, indicating Sevro look closer. Crawling on a twig on the floor of the _terrarium_ was a tiny spider.

“Bugs?” Sevro asked, unimpressed. “You did your project on bugs?”

“ _Arachnids_ ,” Cyther corrected, and Sevro rolled his eyes.

“I could find one of these under my bed.”

“Not this guy, you couldn't.” Cyther tells him. “Not unless you have a molecular accelerator and a few milligrams of plutonium lying around under your bed, too.”

“Plutonium?” Sevro asks. “Why the hell would I have a need for an atomic spider?”

Cyther shrugs. “Who knows? The experiment isn't about need, it's about possibility. I fired radiation particles at several test subjects to see if there was any observable change over time.”

“And?” Sevro prompts.

“All of them died.” Cyther points at his remaining specimen. “Except that guy.”

Sevro snorts. “Great experiment.

“Yeah, it's been very popular, as you can see.” Cyther indicates his empty corner of the room. “Anyway, since you're here—why don't you observe him for any, uh, signs of change for a second. I've had to piss for like, half an hour.”

Before Sevro can protest, Cyther hightails it out from behind his exhibit table, calling out, “I'll be right back! Don't touch anything!”

Sevro shakes his head in disbelief, then turns back to the spider cage. The spider just sits there. “This project totally sucks.”

He glances around, and realizes he's lost sight of Quinn. Great. No one in the entire room appears to be paying attention to him.

He gets a bad idea.

Slowly, he pops open the cage lid. The spider doesn't stir—he wonders if it's even still alive. All the other ones died, Cyther had said. Well, either way, it would be easier to observe a change if it was moving. He looks around for something to prod it with, and decides to fish out one of the leaves at the bottom of the cage.

He moves his hand just a bit too close to the spider.

There is a brief moment where he thinks he might have blinked, because the spider _appears_ to move, or maybe it doesn't—then a burning sensation in his hand that spreads up his arm and over his whole body in seconds. He yanks his hand out of the cage, gasping. _What the hell?_

Had it bit him? His forehead is sweating and his vision blurring. He looks at his hand, and through the haze sees two tiny, almost invisible spots of blood on the skin between his thumb and pointer finger. Like pinpricks.

Sevro staggers forward, crashing against the table in an effort to keep standing, before falling to the floor. Now people are noticing, now the crowd is starting to run towards him. He hears someone cry out, “Sevro!”

His vision starts to go dark. He's dimly aware of hands on him, shaking him. But it's so hard to feel anything over the sensation of hundreds, thousands of tiny skittering legs, crawling up his stomach, his arms, now his face—

He opens his mouth to scream and blacks out.

***

When he comes to, it's Quinn's face that he sees first. She is leaning over him, so close their noses are almost touching. He sits up with a heaving gasp.

“Sevro! Oh my god, are you okay? You should lie down—”

First the beating, now he passes out. A+ day, he thinks.

“Yo, little dude,” Cyther is standing behind Quinn, “Man, if I'd known you were gonna faint, I wouldn't have asked you to—”

“I didn't faint.” Sevro grunts. “Quinn, I'm fine.”

“This is my fault, we should have just gone straight home after—”

“It's not your fault, and I said I'm fine.” He pushes her hand away and gets to his feet. The crowd of onlookers takes a step back. Which is good, because he feels like he's about to projectile vomit. He focuses very intently on not doing that. “We should head home, though. My mom's probably worried. I didn't tell her we were going anywhere after school today.”

Quinn nods, as they head out of the fair. Behind him, Sevro hears Cyther say, “Shit—not you, too.”

He glances over his shoulder, in time to see Cyther dump the entire contents of the terrarium into the trash in frustration.

The spider is dead.

***

Quinn deposits him at his doorstep before crossing the street to her own house. She wants to stay to talk to his mother, but Sevro rather roughly barks at her something about not needing to be babysat. She leaves with a quiet goodbye, and he wonders why he can't ever accept her trying to look out for him.

Probably because it would be too humiliating.

His mom is eating Chinese takeout at the kitchen table and penning something on loose leaf paper. He's not sure how she sees what she's writing through the mane of curly red hair in her face. He manages a small smile which quickly fades as she looks up and sees him.

“Sevro?” Bryn asks, a small gasp escaping her when she sees his swollen face. “Again?”

“It's nothing, mom.” He says quickly, and she rolls her eyes as she hurries to the fridge for ice.

“Bullshit. What was it this time? Sidewalk trip you? Pole came out of nowhere? Perhaps a stray, flying textbook—”

“Okay, _okay_!” Sevro holds out his hands. “Your sarcasm hurts more than these battle wounds, woman.”

She snorts as she runs a wet towel over his face. “Those battle wounds are gonna be all kinds of fun colors tomorrow...” She says of his bruises.

“It was Antonia.” He tells her. There's no point lying about it.

“Yeah, I worked that out for myself already.” Bryn's words are rough, but her hands are gentle as she cleans him up. It still stings, but the cold cloth on his face lessons his nausea somewhat. He closes his eyes. “If you wouldn't have such a hissy fit every time I tried to go to your principal—”

“Mom, are you kidding me? The principal knows. She's the one who raised that little demon.” The principal is Agrippina Julii, Antonia's step-mother. “She'd probably have _me_ kicked out of school.”

“Probably so.” His mother agrees, handing him the ice wrapped in a fresh towel. “You're all clean. Put that on your face and go to bed, you little goblin.”

“I have homework.” Sevro says. His head rebels against the thought, the pounding increasing. Bryn takes one look at him and shakes her head.

“Give me your backpack.”

Sevro looks at her and breaks into a relieved grin. “Mom. Seriously?”

Bryn points an accusing finger his way. “This ain't gonna become a thing, you got that?”

He hands her his books, crowing, “I should get beat up every day!” She swats the bloody towel at him and he dodges, making a face. The sudden movement causes him to sway on the spot, bile rising in his throat. Bryn notices.

“Okay, seriously, get yourself to bed.” She tells him, and Sevro trundles up the stairs dutifully. She calls after him. “Straight into bed, you don't have to brush your teeth tonight, okay? I don't want to find you drowned in the toilet.”

Sevro cheers, and she just shakes her head, spreading his homework out over the counter. Bryn wrinkles her nose. “Ah, shit. I hate algebra.”

***  
  
Sevro does go straight to bed, but sleep does not come easily.

As the night wears on, his symptoms worsen. His headache is blinding, his nausea overwhelming, but he can't vomit. He feels trapped, unable to sit up or roll over, and the feeling of bugs—no, _spiders—_ crawling all over his body has returned. Their legs scratch him, burning his skin as they cover him like a blanket, millions of them now, weaving him into a web of fear. He wills it to stop over and over, but it never does.

...And then it does.

***  
  
He can't remember falling asleep. But suddenly he is waking up.

Like he did at the fair, Sevro sits up with a sudden gasp, sucking in air. The sun is just peeking over the horizon. He is thirsty, his throat dry, scratchy. He needs water. He kicks off his blankets and beelines for his door.

On his way past the bathroom, he catches the briefest glance of himself in the mirror and comes to a screeching halt.

Slowly, he turns. He stares at the person in the mirror. A reflection that is distinctly _not his_ stares back. Bewildered, he inches closer.

Where Sevro has a hunched back from years of slouching, Not Sevro had broad shoulders and bronzed back muscles. Where Sevro has a concave chest, Not Sevro had defined abs and hips that slope sharply into his boxers. Where Sevro has skinny chicken arms and legs, Not Sevro had toned biceps and strong... whatever the equivalent of biceps were for legs, he hasn't been paying attention in Anatomy.

He's so distracted by this reflection that isn't his that when he finally reaches it's face, he nearly falls backwards in shock. Because it's _his face_ , on someone _else's_ body, but his face is clear of any signs of yesterday's altercation. No fun colors. No bruises. No swelling.

How was this possible?

Sevro bolts back to his room, thirst forgotten, and locks the door behind him. Frantically, he pats himself down. Prods his face. No pain. And more importantly, all him. This body, this new body, is all him, as impossible as that sounds.

Furtively, he peeks inside his boxers, then snaps the elastic back with a disappointed sigh. Okay, not everything has changed.

A knock on his door nearly sends him jumping out of his (new?) skin.

“Sevro? How are you feeling?” His mother calls through the door.

“Uh, just a minute!” He yelps, throwing on some clothes. He's not sure why he wants to hide, but the unavoidable knowledge that _something_ is not right nags at him—he doesn't want anyone to find out about this before he figures it out first. Not even his mom. She'll worry.

More or less dressed, he opens the door for her. She stops in shock when she sees his face, and he belatedly realizes that there's no way to explain his miraculous healing.

“Uh...”

“What—” She splutters. “ _How_ —”

“See, I told you it was no big deal.” Sevro says.

“Sev, that's impossible!” Bryn says. “I mean, I saw—”

“Mom, the results are indisputable.” He sweeps a hand over his face like a game show model revealing a prize. “It looked worse than it was.”

Bryn still doesn't look convinced, but she finally smiles, and nods. “You know what? I'm just glad you're okay.” She kisses his forehead and hands him his backpack. “You need to hurry, you'll be late. And try to be careful today. Stick with Quinn.”

“Okay, mom, I will, I will...” Sevro says, slinging his backpack over his shoulder and runs out the door, shrugging back at her. “Hey, just three and a half more years to go, right?" Bryn laughs despite herself.

She doesn't know that he's not going to be careful today; that was a lie. But if something really _has_ changed, he may not need Quinn to be his superhero anymore, either.  
  
***  
  
“Sevro... are you okay?” Quinn asks him on the bus.

He's bouncing in his seat, full of boundless energy. He wants to run and jump, maybe do a few cartwheels. “Sure, Quinn, I'm great. Fantastic, actually, never felt better, I feel like I could run a mile right now, honestly, I was sort of thinking of skipping the bus and walking to school, anyways how are you doing?”

She stares at him. “I'm fine. Did you, um, realize that—”

“My face is completely healed? _Cuh-ray-zee_ , right?” Sevro beams at her. Quinn looks very skeptical.

The bus pulls up in front of the school and Sevro practically climbs over her in his rush to get out.

“Why are you in such a hurry all of a sudden?” She asks, rushing to keep up with him.

He turns around to face her, walking backwards, a huge grin on his face. “I just feel like today is going to be a really great day.”

Sevro slams into someone without seeing who it is and whips forward again. “Okay, can we watch where we're walking please—”

His face goes slightly purple as he realizes he just knocked into Antonia. Her books are spilled on the ground, and she is staring at Sevro like a cat that just cornered it's prey. She smiles.

Quinn steps up to stand beside Sevro. He glances over his shoulder and realizes Antonia's friends are closing in on him from behind.

“You should pick those up.” Antonia tells him, voice bored.

Sevro looks down at the books by his feet. He looks up at Antonia.

He kicks the books, sending them skittering across the pavement to her feet.

“Pick 'em up yourself.” He tells her.

Antonia raises an eyebrow. Quinn blinks. People are staring. Sevro has to work not to grin.

“Let's go.” He says, shouldering his backpack and walking straight past Antonia.

“We'll see you after school, then.” Antonia calls after him.

Quinn turns to respond, but Sevro cuts her off, stomping up to Antonia, his nose inches away from hers. Or it would be, if she wasn't still a lot taller than him. But the sentiment is there.

“No.” He says. “I'll see _you_ after school. And this is gonna be the _last time_ , Antonia. So I hope we can enjoy ourselves.”

He storms back to Quinn, who is staring at him like she thinks he's lost his mind.

“Have you _lost_ your _mind?!”_ She hisses at him. Okay, well.

“Maybe.” He tells her as they walk up the front steps of the school.

He's not sure yet.

***  
  
Three o'clock rolls around and now he's doubting himself, just a tiny bit. He doesn't even know what's going on. Maybe he acquired stupidity along with his abs.

“But I challenged them.” He says to Quinn, as they walk resolutely to the lunch area. “So I can't back down now.”

“Technically, you sorta just like, reversed the words of their challenge.” Quinn observes helpfully.

“That's not a solid argument.” Sevro protests. He glances at her out of the corner of his eye. “You don't have to come with me, you know. You could get in trouble if someone sees us.”

“I'm coming.” Quinn says firmly. “Besides, I will _probably_ have to save you again.”

“...Thanks.”

Antonia is waiting for them. Waiting for him, really. She's not alone, not that any of them had assumed she would be.

“Well, I wasn't sure you'd actually show up, once you realized how screwed you were.” She says as they walk towards her. She pats the spot next to her on the bench. “Quinn, why don't you sit here? We can watch together.”

Quinn hocks a loogie at her. Antonia wrinkles her nose.

“Maybe you two _are_ made for each other.” She says scornfully, then shoots Sevro an evil grin. “That'd make you happy, wouldn't it?” Sevro's face burns.

“Antonia, nobody actually likes it when you talk.” He spits out. “So shut up, and fight me. Or, well—” He points at one of her thick-muscled followers. “Whatever your name is. You fight me, I guess.”

The boy, whose shoulders are easily as wide as Sevro is tall, slams his fist into his other hand. “It's Cipio.”

Sevro swings around to face Quinn, eyes wide. “I am officially regretting all the decisions I've made up to this point.”

“Sevro, _move_!” Quinn shouts, but he is... already moving? Without turning, he sidesteps to the left and Cipio goes barreling past, narrowly missing him. How did he know that was about to happen?

His quick reaction takes him clear of the danger, but Quinn was already moving to push him out of the way, putting her right in Cipio's path. He shoulder checks her and she goes flying to the ground, landing hard. It probably hurt, but her eyes flash—she looks ready to breathe fire.

Cipio doesn't seem to care who he's fighting. He reaches down and picks Quinn up by her collar. She tries to kick him.

“Let her go!” Sevro shouts, and takes a running jump onto Cipio's back. Cipio drops Quinn in favor of dealing with the insane spider monkey scaling him, fingers gouging at his eyes. He contorts around, managing to grab the back of Sevro's shirt, and flings the smaller boy off as hard as he can.

Sevro flips mid-air, landing feet first like a cat, gravel spraying out behind him as he slides backwards. Quinn picks herself up from the ground, dazed.

“When the hell,” she pants, “did you become a circus acrobat?”

“Last night.” Sevro responds. “I got this.”

“Sevro!” Quinn shouts as he darts forward, but he ignores her.

Sevro runs straight into arm's reach of Cipio, who swings at him wildly. It's like dodging butterflies. Sevro twists right, fades left, spins, and elbows the other boy right in the face. Cipio stumbles backwards, holding a hand to his nose, which starts to bleed.

Sevro relaxes his arms at his sides. Cipio glares at him through his fingers. But he's not charging anymore. Well, that won't do.

Sevro grins. “Scared?”

Cipio's eyes narrow, but Antonia leans forward in her seat and hisses at him, “ _Are you?”_

This sends him into action. He rushes Sevro again, but Sevro dodges just as effortlessly. Punches whistle past his head, but it's like he doesn't even need to see them. In fact...

He closes his eyes and grins widely at Cipio. He can still hear him—no, he can _sense_ him. He can sense which direction danger comes from. At any other time, this would be almost too weird to handle, but right now, it's hilarious. He's like lightning. He can feel this.

He's untouchable.

Sevro can tell Cipio is getting winded, so he opens his eyes. Time to end this. Time to end it for good.

He stops his dancing around for a second and Cipio grapples him, eyes sparking with success. But Sevro is much, much stronger now than he used to be—stronger even than a boy two times his size. He doesn't crumble.

“So,” he says, his voice low, so only Cipio can hear him. “If I just walk away right now, will you tell them to leave me alone? You know you lost.”

“I'm not losing to a _loser_.” Cipio growls, arms straining to force Sevro to the ground.

“What are you waiting for?!” Sevro hears Antonia shout.

“Fine.” He says. “I'll tell them myself.”

Slippery fast, he knees Cipio right in the nuts to break free of his hold. As the other boy's face contorts, Sevro lets him sink to his knees. Antonia and her whole gang are watching him.

With a speed even more ferocious than his lazy earlier attempts, Sevro leaps up and lands a vicious roundhouse kick straight in Cipio's face. Cipio slumps like a rag doll on the ground.

Sevro glares at Antonia, at all of his former bullies. Their mouths are all wide open, all of them except Antonia, who presses her lips into a thin line.

“You are free to leave.” Sevro says. And then because he can, he sweeps into an ironic bow, showing them all out.

Antonia stares at him for a long moment, then collects herself and stands.

“We're done here.” She says to her gang. As they clear out, she spits, “ _Leave him,”_ as one of them goes to help a moaning Cipio. He is left to stagger after them on his own.

Once they are all gone, Sevro turns to Quinn. She gestures wildly at him.

“ _What_.”

“I _know_.”

“What—”

“I don't know!”

“WHAT?!”

“I have no idea!” Sevro crows, gleeful, pumping his fists in the air.

Then Quinn throws her arms around him. “I thought they were gonna—I don't know, like, kill you, or something—”

Sevro freezes in place, all his prior bravado deserting him in an instant. Stunned at her close proximity, with his arms still lifted in the air, he clenches his fists.

In something of a haze of horror and shock, he sees some...some _thing_ erupt from his hands into the sky, something white and ropey and sticky.

 _No..._ He thinks, bewildered. _No, that's not supposed to come from there._

As the substance falls all around them, covering their hair and clothes, Quinn notices. She stiffens, and then shrieks, leaping away from him. Sevro blearily picks some of it out of his hair, wondering what he ever did in life to deserve this fate. And then inhales sharply.

“Quinn, stop— _stop screaming.”_ He says, as realization hits him. Everything starts to click into place.

He knows what this is.

It's a web.


End file.
